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Speaker 1: We use the term witch hunt an awful lot these days,

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Speaker 1: and it's usually associated with mass hysteria, so it only

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Speaker 1: seems fitting to take a look back at the origin

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Speaker 1: of the phrase, particularly as we approach Halloween. Right. Well, now,

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Speaker 1: consider this couple the original American witch hunt in Salem, Massachusetts,

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Speaker 1: back in the early sixteen nineties, with the most haunted

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Speaker 1: houses there. I'm Patty Steele. The bad energy that lingers

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Speaker 1: after a witch hunt. That's next on the backstory. We're

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Speaker 1: back with the backstory. You may know a little bit

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Speaker 1: about the Salem witch Trials, but I'm going to give

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Speaker 1: you a rundown anyway. They took place in sixteen ninety

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Speaker 1: two and sixteen ninety three in Salem, Massachusetts. More than

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Speaker 1: two hundred people were accused of witchcraft. Twenty were executed,

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Speaker 1: nineteen by hanging, and one a man was pressed to

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Speaker 1: death with large stones in a tempt to force a

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Speaker 1: confession out of him. At least six others died in

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Speaker 1: prison or while being tested for being a witch. What's

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Speaker 1: amazing is it was over three hundred years ago, but

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Speaker 1: it wasn't until twenty twenty two that the last person

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Speaker 1: finally had her name cleared. All of the accused and

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Speaker 1: convicted were exonerated on a case by case basis over

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Speaker 1: the centuries, but somehow Elizabeth Johnson Junior slipped through the cracks.

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Speaker 1: She wasn't executed, but historians think that's because she was

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Speaker 1: intellectually disabled and more apt to make a false confession,

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Speaker 1: so they finally released her. She was cleared only three

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Speaker 1: years ago, when a group of eighth graders from Danvers, Massachusetts,

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Speaker 1: went to the state legislature to get her exonerated. The

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Speaker 1: Salem witch trials began when the town was experiencing some

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Speaker 1: upset over church politics, family feuds, and financial upset, and

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Speaker 1: people wanted to blame pretty much anything, so they blamed

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Speaker 1: the devil. I was common in those days. Three girls,

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Speaker 1: ages nine, eleven, and twelve started the mass hysteria by

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Speaker 1: throwing fits, and they blamed their upset on three poor

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Speaker 1: elderly women in Salem. One of those women panicked and said,

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Speaker 1: the devil came to me and bid me serve him.

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Speaker 1: She said there were other witches in town, and some

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Speaker 1: of them confessed as well, and they named others. It

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Speaker 1: was all in an effort to lessen their own charges.

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Speaker 1: But the confessions and finger pointing amped up the hysteria

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Speaker 1: even more. As months went by, dozens more were accused.

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Speaker 1: They were tested, but witch tests were kind of impossible

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Speaker 1: to pass. There was the swimming test. The judge said

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Speaker 1: that if the accused floated, they were guilty because the

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Speaker 1: water would reject evil. But if the person sank, they

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Speaker 1: were innocent, although of course they often drowned if they sank.

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Speaker 1: And there was the touch test. The accused had to

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Speaker 1: touch their victim, and if that person felt pain or

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Speaker 1: screamed out, the accused was guilty. Of course, the hysterical

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Speaker 1: accusers could easily lie and scream out in pain even

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Speaker 1: if they didn't feel anything. Finally, the Governor, William Phipps

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Speaker 1: ordered a special court to be set up and the

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Speaker 1: trials began. Within several weeks, the first execution took place,

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Speaker 1: and nineteen more followed over the course of the four

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Speaker 1: month trials. The whole thing ended when the governor's own

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Speaker 1: wife was called in to be questioned as a possible witch.

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Speaker 1: Phipps immediately dissolved the court and pardoned those who were

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Speaker 1: still in prison. So where do the haunted houses come in. Well,

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Speaker 1: there's the Salem Witch House, which still stands and is

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Speaker 1: a huge attraction for folks who want a taste of

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Speaker 1: the paranormal. Owned back in the sixteen hundreds by Jonathan Corwin,

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Speaker 1: one of the judges in the witch trials. There have

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Speaker 1: been a whole bunch of haunting claims made by visitors,

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Speaker 1: including ghostly sightings and voices, but the house considered the

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Speaker 1: most haunted in Salem wasn't even there until some time

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Speaker 1: in the mid seventeen hundreds. So why is it so haunted? Well,

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Speaker 1: it turns out the Joshua Ward House, built between seventeen

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Speaker 1: fifty four and seventeen eighty four, was built on the

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Speaker 1: site of the house owned in sixteen ninety two by

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Speaker 1: Sheriff George Corwin, nephew of the judge who owned the

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Speaker 1: Witch House. It seems George was a vicious piece of work.

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Speaker 1: He was the twenty five year old high Sheriff of

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Speaker 1: Essex County, where Salem was located. Corwin signed the arrest warrants.

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Speaker 1: He had the job of choosing the site for the

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Speaker 1: executions and also the job of torturing the accused to

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Speaker 1: force confessions out of them. Now ord has it that

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Speaker 1: in some cases he'd tie the neck of the accused

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Speaker 1: to their ankles so tightly that blood ran out of

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Speaker 1: their noses. That earned him the nickname strangler. In the

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Speaker 1: case of one elderly male victim, he laid boards on

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Speaker 1: top of him and loaded them down with heavier and

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Speaker 1: heavier stones until he was crushed to death. Corwin himself

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Speaker 1: died of a heart attack just a few years later

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Speaker 1: at the age of thirty, but the energy left behind

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Speaker 1: on that property is unsettled, to say the least. Multiple

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Speaker 1: witnesses who visited the house, which is now an inn,

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Speaker 1: claim they've been strangled while visiting while no one else

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Speaker 1: was in the room. Some folks claim to have seen

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Speaker 1: what they think is the ghost of that elderly man

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Speaker 1: who was crushed to death during the trials, and also

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Speaker 1: the ghostly appearance of a woman dressed in black who

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Speaker 1: wanders the halls wailing. They were even able to snap

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Speaker 1: a photo of her. And finally, others say they've suddenly

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Speaker 1: had scratches or burns appear on their arms while on

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Speaker 1: the property. None of this seemed to impact George Washington.

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Speaker 1: He'd been president for just six months, and he asked

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Speaker 1: to stay in the Joshua Ward House while on a

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Speaker 1: seventeen eighty nine tour of New England. Apparently the ghost

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Speaker 1: of the Strangler stayed quiet. I hope you're enjoying The

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Speaker 1: Backstory with Patty Steele. Please leave a review, or follow

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Speaker 1: a story you'd like me to cover. On Facebook, It's

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Speaker 1: Patty Steele and on Instagram Real Patty Steele. I'm Patty Steele.

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Speaker 1: The Backstories a production of iHeartMedia, Premiere Networks, the Elvis

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Speaker 1: Duran Group, and Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Doug Fraser.

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Speaker 1: Our writer Jake Kushner. We have new episodes every Tuesday

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Speaker 1: and Friday. Feel free to reach out to me with

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Speaker 1: comments and even story suggestions on Instagram at Real Patty

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Speaker 1: Steele and on Facebook at Patty Steele. Thanks for listening

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Speaker 1: to the Backstory with Patty Steele. The pieces of history

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Speaker 1: you didn't know you needed to know.